


Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

by De_Laruta



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Angry Katara (Avatar), Bad Ideas, Betrothal Necklace (Avatar), F/M, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:16:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26301037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/De_Laruta/pseuds/De_Laruta
Summary: Question: How much damage can one kid from America cause in the Avatarverse?Answer: Enough!
Relationships: The Gaang (Avatar) & Original Character(s)
Kudos: 1





	Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer:   
> I regret nothing

It was a crisp morning in the northern water tribe and all was set for Aang and his friend's departure. Their time in the north had been brief but far from forgettable, both in good ways and in bad.

But for better or worse, good or bad, the memories they would take with them no doubt last their entire lifetimes.

As Aang and Sokka helped each other with loading the last of their supplies onto Appa's saddle, the young avatar couldn't help but smile as he looked up and saw Katara exchange one last tender farewell with her water bending master and former greatest obstacle in earning the respect that she rightfully deserved.

The old man and the young woman, who might have been his granddaughter in another life, exchanged one last bow and a hug as if they were in fact family.

And to think, the girl's animosity towards the old man had been so fierce that Aang found himself blushing at some of the things he had heard her say about him. The memories left him with a sudden urge to offer up a silent apology to the spirits of his fallen people and to Katara's still-living grandmother while he was at it.

"Aang… Aang… Yo! Earth to Avatar!"

A sudden tapping on the smooth dome of his head brought anything out of his woolgathering. The little Airbender blinked his large eyes before looking up at the older water tribe boy who looked down at him with a cocked eyebrow.

"Did you say something, Sokka?" Aang asked.

"I asked if you're excited to be getting back out on the road again?"

"Excited?"

"Yeah, excited!" Sokka replied. "I figured that with you being a nomad and all, you'd wanna start being… You know… nomadic again?"

And couldn't help but giggle at his friends simple but no less accurate way of thinking.

"Yeah, as much as I've loved our time here up in the north, I am starting to feel a little bit heavy footed," he said, finding some small comfort in using the old airbender term; one which neither he, nor anyone else has probably heard in a century. "And besides… If I'm going to learn how to earthbend, I'm going to have to go somewhere where there are actually earth benders to teach me."

Their conversation was cut short by Katara's sudden arrival. The girl was practically beaming with a sense of pride that radiated from her like warmth from a hot spring.

"So, her majesty finally decides to join us hard-working laborers huh?" Sokka greeted her with a lopsided grin. "Or has she just come to make sure we packed away all her fancy dresses and jewelry?"

"Oh, go hug a penguin-seal, Sokka!" Katara replied, giving her older brother a playful shove, which caused him to fall back against the soft woolly hide of Oppa's enormous flank. "Master Paku wanted to give me something before we headed out." She held up a small ceramic bottle which hung from a slender leather cord.

Her brother's eyes lit up. "Is it more meat?" he asked.

Katara just blinked at the older boy's question. She looked at the bottle, then back at him, raised her eyebrow even further.

"What?" Sokka asked. "Dad always says when it comes to procuring supplies there are no stupid questions."

Instead of replying, Katara just shook her head causing the little beads in her hair loops to rattle softly. She then looked to Aang Who stood off to the side, watching the playful bickering between brother and sister with a gentle smile on his face while he leaned against his staff.

"So how's everything going?" She asked "Everything all set for us to head out?"

The young avatar smiled brightly and nodded. "Sokka and I just finished loading the last of the supplies." He pointed behind him with his thumb, indicating the rather large pile of supplies securely tied down to the back of Oppa's equally large saddle. "We'll be ready to leave as soon as Terry gets here."

At the mention of the name, Katara looked up and swept her gaze from one side of the icy plaza to the other. A scowl formed on her face as her two deep blue eyes sought out their group's missing fourth member; the boy from another world (or so he claimed) whom they had come to know simply as 'Terry' these past few months.

"You mean he's not here?"

"Haven't seen that dude all morning," Sokka answered. "Not since he slipped off with that northern girl last night during the party."

The northern water tribe had thrown them a spectacular feast as both a way of commemorating the avatar's victory over the invading fire nation fleet and as a sendoff for the young heroes who had helped him. it has been during one of the many speeches given that their inner dimensional companion had quietly slipped away arm in arm with a rather pretty looking water tribe girl with two large braids and a face that was as cheerful as it was round.

Katara had no doubt in her mind just where Terry had spent the rest of the evening and probably the entirety of that morning.

"So in other words, he left you two to do all the work while he goes off and plays Kissy-face?"

Sokka shrugged. "Yeah, I'd say that sounds about right."

For Katara, there was always a very fine line between annoyance and anger and lately she was finding that line constantly being crossed on account of their fourth companions antics, quirks and all-around annoying tendencies that seemed to be the core foundations of his outlandish personality.

"How much longer are we going to have to put up with this?" She asked, this time addressing Aang. "I mean, seriously! It's just the same tiresome routine with him, over and over and over again!"

"I know, Katara" Aang said. "But he's trying!"

"Is he, Aang? Is he really?"

"OK… Maybe he could try little harder."

The older girl put her hands on her hips, scowled at her friend with a look that could probably freeze sunlight itself. "I think after some of the crap he's pulled, he can try a lot harder!"

"He will!"

"He'd better!"

"I promise Katara."

As Katara looked down into the little boy's bright, pleading eyes, she found her self unable to hold onto her rising anger. She let out a long sigh, allowed herself to feel the pride and joy she had felt upon taking her leave of Paku and the words of praise and encouragement he had given her.

Yes, she would just simply concentrate on that and not let anything else—

"Good morning everyone!" The all-too-familiar sound of Terry's voice suddenly rang out across the plaza.

The three travelers quickly looked to where the voice had originated, saw the obscured shape of a young man awkwardly making his way out from beneath the shade of an archway. He tripped and stumbled over his own feet while he attempted to slip into a pair of pants, kicked his foot through the remaining leg before quickening his pace.

"Everything all ready for us to go?" The boy from another dimension asked, crossing the remainder of the plaza in great loping strides that carried him across the ice almost as swiftly as a penguin-seal. "Everything all packed up? Everything all ship-shape and ready for us to get up in the air?"

Aang glanced at Katara then at Sokka, before looking back at Terry. "Ummm… Yeah, we just finished packing right before you showed up."

"Yeah, thanks for that by the way." Sucka added. "Would've been real nice if you'd shown up to actually help us, you know."

"Yeah I'm sorry about that," Terry apologized a little too quickly, glanced over his shoulder before adding, "I was in a… situation that I… ahh, couldn't exactly get away from… not as quickly as I would've liked to, anyway."

"And just what sort of 'situation' were you getting yourself into this time?" Katara added. "Is Aang going to have to clean up after another one of your messes here, like he did back in Kiyoshi?"

"Hey here's an idea," Terry replied, stepping past Katara and moving towards Aang and his flying bison; both of whom were staring at him quizzically. "Why don't we save all the questions for later, when we're all up in the air and riding the open road of the skies."

"Why, what's the rush?" Aang asked. "The northern water tribe wanted to give us a send off! There's going to be a dance and songs and everything!"

"Yeah, yeah, that sounds great and I would just love for all of us to stick around and see it but Aang…" he took a step closer to the young Airbender, leaned down and placed both hands on the younger boy's small shoulders. "We've got to go… and we've got to go, right now!"

And with a heave, he lifted the boy onto Oppa's head.

"What did you do?" Katara said slowly, watched as her least favorite traveling companion deposited himself in Oppa's saddle with a graceless 'plop'.

"Something that seemed like a good idea at the time. And I'll gladly fill you in on the details just as soon as we—"

"TERRRRRRRY!" A high, fluty voice suddenly rang out from the same archway that he had emerged from only a few minutes prior.

The boy from another dimension suddenly became as white as the surrounding snow, eyes widening, his mouth dropping open as if becoming unhinged from the rest of his face.

"Oh fuck me, she's here!" He said under his breath.

As Katara and her brother settled themselves in their usual riding spots, they looked to the far end of the plaza where the water tribe girl they had seen with Terry the previous evening was running towards them. Her parka whipped about as she called out to Terry again, cupping a thickly mittened hand over her mouth while she waved frantically with the other.

"Isn't that the girl you were with last night?" Aang asked, tilted his smooth, arrow-marked head to one side as he watched the girl make her way towards them, closing the distance with each rapid step.

Instead of answering, Terry looked back at the water tribe girl calling out to him, slapped the most insincere smile Katara had have ever seen on a human being and reached out with one hand.

"Kaa-una!" He practically gushed. "There's my sweet little Eskimo pie! I'm sorry I just slipped out like that without saying goodbye, it's just I uhhhhh… you just looked so beautiful sleeping there all warm and cuddly and—" he suddenly began nudging Aang's shoulder. "Go… go… go… go, go, go, go, go, go, go, GO!"

The last nudge turned into a full on punch, and with a yelp the avatar whipped his flying bison's reins. The great beast gave a rumbling moan before, rose to all six of his furry legs before launching his enormous, bovine shape up into the air. With a slap of his paddle like tail, they were swiftly cutting a path over the Northern City's icy structure.

"I love you, baby!" Terry called out to the girl named Kaa-una as she cried out and waved for him to come back with tears all but pouring from her big blue eyes. "I'll always love you! You'll always be in my heart, for destiny shall bring us together— blady-blady-blah-blah-blah-blah and she can't see me anymore!"

He leaned back into the saddle and wiped an arm across his forehead, stared up at the sky and laughed. "Holy shit!" he said through a sigh. "Holy fucking shit! That had to be just about the worst idea I've ever had!"

"You are going to tell us what that was all about back there, right?" Sokka asked, moving a little closer to his otherworldly traveling companion. "That girl really looked like she was pretty upset to see you go."

"Yeah well… I may have said a few things too many to her last night… Actually, scratch that! I know for a fact that I said too many things to her last night!"

"Such as?" Katara asked, her tone icy and brittle.

"Let's not get into the messy details, alright?" Terry shot back. "I made a really bad call and the only reason I managed to get out of it was because, lucky for us, the sky is the fucking limit!" He let himself sprawl, taking up his usual amount of too much space in the saddle as he slowly shook his head. "It's over and done with, so why don't we all just count our blessings and move on.

"Terry…" Katara looked him straight in the face, thumbed the stopper of one of her water skins. "what… did… you… do?"

"Hypothetically speaking?" he asked, didn't wait for her to answer before quickly adding; "Just how bad would it be if, say… I told a water tribe girl that I …would marry her… in order to get her in bed with me?"

Sokka's jaw was in his lap and Katara just continued to stare while her cheeks slowly took on a more reddish hue.

"You didn't!" Sokka finally said.

"Hey, like I said, before… this is all hypothetical."

"You're unbelievable!" Katara shouted. "I can't believe you would stoop that low!"

"What do you want me to say?" Terry asked with a shrug. "I really, really, wanted to sleep with one of these northern girls and unfortunately, your people have so many traditions and customs and taboos that it kind of makes things more complicated than they need to be."

"So you lied to some poor girl who now has to go back to her family and explain why she won't be a virgin for her future husband?"

"Honestly? I didn't think that was even a issue with you guys."

"Dude…" Sokka chimed in. "When has that sort of thing ever NOT been an issue?"

"I guess it was a little presumptuous of me."

"Presumptuous?" Katara asked, her mind still trying to wrap itself around what the boy from another dimension had just told them. "That's all you have to say for yourself? That you were presumptuous?"

"Like I said earlier, it was a bad call. A really… really bad call."

"Hold on a second, back up!" Sokka chimed in once more. "How did you even get her to go along without an engagement necklace? Women of the Water Tribes are absolute sticklers for that sort of thing!" He held up both hands, raised one then the other. "No necklace – no nothing."

"Yeah…" Terry once again turned his guilty looking face in Katara's direction, forced himself to look her in the eye before tossing a small bundle of cloth into her lap."… About that."

The Water Tribe Girl looked down at the small object, looked back up at Terry with her eyebrow raised so high that it was practically touching her hairline. Upon picking it up, she shook the cloth bag and felt the familiar weight of her mother's engagement necklace fall into her hand. Her eyes flashed as they looked upon the translucent blue stone with its intricate carvings that glittered in the morning sunlight.

Her fingers closed around it forming into a trembling fist.

"Dude…" Sokka said slowly before scooting away from his sister who was now glaring Icy daggers into the nervous looking boy seated across from her. "Dude… I knew you were crazy… but geeze!" He shook his head and gave Terry a look one might give to a fish that was about to be gutted and thrown into a boiling pot.

"Yeah, I'm starting to think this was an even worse idea than I'd originally thought." Terry looked over at Aang who seemed to be completely oblivious to what was going on behind him. "Hay, Aang… buddy ol' pal… you mind telling me how high above the water we are?"

"Huh?" The little Airbender replied, glancing over his shoulder. "How high are we?"

"Yup," Terry replied, heard the 'pop' of Katara's water skin being uncorked, saw the murderous intent in Katara's glaring eyes. "Just a rough estimate will be fine."

Aang leaned over to the right, peered over the furry slope of Oppa's head. "I'd say we're probably about… I don't know… a hundred feet maybe?" The flying bison gave a rumble. "You're right, Oppa, it is more like a hundred and fifty!"

Terry considered the distance, considered Katara's ever growing wrath, weighed his chances for survival before quickly coming to a decision.

"You know what? Fuck it!" he said, before bolting from his seat. "I'll take my chances with th—"

He had barely made it to the edge of the saddle before A serpentine arm of bent water swiftly wrapped itself around his ankle, yanking him backwards. He landed on his back with a heavy 'thump' that all but knocked the wind from him. Before he could even cry out, the water constricted around his leg immediately began working its way upward, twisting and curling about, spreading to his other limbs is the cold liquid crawled its way up his body and towards his head.

The water stopped just an inch short of the dimensional traveler's nostrils before a sharp twisting of Katara's wrist sapped every last bit of warmth from from the water, freezing it solid in seconds.

By the time it was over, Terry was frozen from head to toe, with only the upper part of his head remaining so that he wouldn't suffocate.

When Aang took another moment to look over his shoulder and ask about what had happened, Katara had already managed to to throw a blanket over the immobilized fourth member of their group before shoving him amongst the rest of there supplies.

"Where's Terry?" He asked.

"Don't worry about it," Katara replied, smiling a little too sweetly before jabbing an elbow into the pile behind her.

Aang decided that it would probably be best not to ask her any more questions.

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s Note:
> 
> I still regret nothing!


End file.
